Nancy's Sticky Rice Recipe

This is Nancy's (Zhao Xiu Zhong) first recipe that is completely hers. The only contribution I made was to tell her to double the sugar for American palates and of course, serving it with maple syrup. Nancy only used 1/8 cup of sugar in her original recipe. Beware, this is not as ridiculously simple as it may first look. It takes some work.

Yield 14 Rice Cakes (Portion is two cakes per person.)
2 Cups Sticky Rice (This is the very short grain rice the Chinese use for desserts.)
1/4 Cup Sunflour Seeds. (We use raw organic.)
1/4 Cup Dried Cranberry (Again we use organic dried.)
1/4 Cup Sugar
Sesame seeds as needed. (We use raw organic.)

First you have to have a steamer.



Get a good one. A metal one. For this application, forget the bamboo steamers. My steamer is old and cheap but it eventually gets the job done. When we need to make a lot of rice cakes, we use my old steamer and it takes about one hour and forty minutes to steam the rice. When we use Nancy's little, new steamer it takes about 20 minutes to get the rice just right.

Almost just right. This is about 1/2 hour away from done.

Put parchment papers in your steamer and poke plenty of holes in it. Then put the rice on top of the parchment and steam. In the meantime, mix together the rest of the ingredients.



When the rice is done, mix together the now cooked and soften sticky rice and the other ingredients.



Fold the rice into the other ingredients. Be gentle.



Then mold in a ring mold. First put the sesame seeds on the bottom of the ring and pack the rice mixture on top. Then sprinkle more sesame on top. Make sure both the top and the bottom is well covered with sesame seeds.





The next step is to pan fry them in a little bit of canola oil until they are golden brown. Don't use too much oil and make sure it is hot before you start frying. Just enough to cover the pan.





Garnish with powder sugar and some fruit. Serve hot.





We also serve our great New York maple syrup with these cakes for those that need a sweeter treat. East meets, well, Yankees. Enjoy this lovely dessert.